Above: Where environmentalism meets art and fashion

The new eco-artsy Above magazine merges environmental and aesthetic concerns.

Can beauty save the world? Yes, according to Above, a new artsy environmental magazine. Taking as its tagline a quote from Dostoevsky — “Beauty Will Save The World” — Above sets out to show that “the arts, fashion, architecture and design can be instrumental in raising awareness about endangered beauty and the urgent need to preserve nature.”

The inaugural 240-page Summer 2009 issue — which you can browse for free online — boasts gorgeous nature photography, artist showcases, and fashion spreads. Features with well-known eco-celebs — including an interview with vegan fashion designer Stella McCartney and a story on Bobby Kennedy Jr.’s work with America’s energy policies — fill out the issue.

Above also brings attention to less well-known eco-activists and artists. A piece on French artist Zineb Sedira’s photography, for example, highlights a project called Floating Coffins, which documents slowly-decaying abandoned boats in Mauritania. Her photography “works as a metaphor for a country that seems to have been discarded and left to rot.”

Some features seem to have only a tenuous relationship to environmentalism — including an ethereal fashion spread that seems vaguely nature inspired but doesn’t really feature eco-clothes — or, really, clothes at all, depending on your definition of clothing. Above, for example, is a “hair skirt” by Julia Reindell.

But other features are both eco-educational and eco-practical. An article on overfishing is accompanied with a helpful copy of Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Sushi guide that readers can clip out and slip into their wallets.

Plus, this issue has cute aerogram-esque letter-envelopes readers can cut out and use as eco-stationery — since the magazine’s printed on chlorine free FSC-certified paper with veggie-based inks.

The quarterly magazine’s available for $10 at Barnes and Noble. Annual subscriptions, unfortunately, will put U.S. residents back a whopping £53, (about $84) as the service is handled by a U.K. company.